


The Serpent Tattoo

by LavenderPhantomCat



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Auror Hermione Granger, Background Blaise Zabini/Neville Longbottom - Freeform, Background Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter - Freeform, Blaise Zabini is a Good Friend, Draco Malfoy is a Good Friend, F/F, Magical Creatures, Magical Tattoos, Monster Fighter Pansy Parkinson, Pansy Parkinson is dramatic as shit, Slow Burn, magical monsters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-01
Updated: 2020-04-12
Packaged: 2021-02-26 02:06:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,230
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21625780
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LavenderPhantomCat/pseuds/LavenderPhantomCat
Summary: Pansy Parkinson is crafting a new life for herself. She's studied Magical Creatures and how to get rid of the nasty ones, she's abandoned her outward rudeness in favor of refined sass, and she's finally made peace with her Death Eater past. All is going well as a freelance magical creature fighter and all-around adventurer until a Prophet reporter shoves her nose in Parkinson's business, resulting in a not-so-kind falsified report to the DMLE claiming Parkinson's involved in the dark arts again. Hermione Granger is assigned the surveillance of Parkinson to ensure there's no dark artistry occurring, only to get to know Pansy as more than a  childhood bully.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter, Hermione Granger/Pansy Parkinson, Neville Longbottom/Blaise Zabini
Comments: 11
Kudos: 107





	1. Chapter 1

"What were you thinkin'?" Asked Velma, her pen poised on an unused page of her sketchbook, emerald hair illuminated by the lights hanging from the tall ceilings of the tattoo parlor.

Pansy bit the inside of her mouth. "What do you think?" 

Velma set down her pen gently, folding her fingers in front of her. The Hydra tattoos that called the back of Velma's hands home moved gently, their animated quality some of the only movement in the room. "I have had this idea in the back of my mind for a while now, and I haven't found anyone who it would be good for yet. But I'm thinking, and this is only a suggestion, 'course, it might be a fit for you." 

Pansy cocked a suspicious, perfectly-manicured brow in interest. "Go on…" 

"You're gonna stab me for this one, Parkinson, but I was thinkin' a snake." 

Pansy scoffed. "No. Fucking. Way." 

"Ay! You didn't let me finish." Pansy pursed her lips and let Velma continue. Velma tucked a lock of deep green hair from her face, brushing the many silver piercings that lined up against the soft curve of her ear. "I was gonna say that I was thinkin' a Rod of Asclepius." 

"I'm not a healer," Said Pansy, confused. Pansy thought the Rod of Asclepius was reserved for hospitals and such.

"I'm not suggesting it because of a job. I'm suggesting it 'cause it's a symbol of healing, in a medicinal way, yea, but we can change that. You can change what it means to you. Like, I know you're always off studyin'. You're off trying to leave a legacy. You're trying to make this hell-hole a better place, and make yourself a better person. That's healing." 

Pansy was silent a minute. She looked at her left forearm, meeting the now-grey death mark. The spots of the python were still there, even though there was scarring over them. "Can you make it a snake other than a python?" 

Velma smiled a little. "I can make it any fuckin' snake you want it to be, Pans." 

* * *

Pansy had been drinking tea with Velma, the winter's wind roaring outside the tattoo parlor, looking at designs. 

"Velma," spoke Pansy, looking at the Rod of Asclepius design in front of her. "What if I had this on my back and then something else on my arm?" 

Velma looked up from the beat-up paperback she'd been reading. "What would you want on your arm?" 

Pansy was silent for a moment before an idea clicked in her head. "A snakeskin. Being overcome by flowers." 

The corner of Velma's mouth turned up. "That's a good idea. What flowers you thinkin'?" 

"What do Pansies symbolize?" 

Velma bit at her fingernail, combing through her mind for any clues. "I've heard 'free-thinking.'" 

Pansy smiled. "Well, that's perfectly fabulous." 


	2. Tattooed Into Freedom

The weather was still viciously gloomy in Magical London, but Pansy paid it no mind. The howling of the wind and pattering of raindrops was comforting to her. Velma's tattoo parlor was empty, save for some interns cleaning tools and organizing the markers the artists used to trace the tattoo design onto skin. The ceilings were tall, simple light fixtures dangling from it. The windows were big, but the drapes were drawn. Velma's Tattoo prided itself in privacy. 

Pansy could see lamplight illuminating the floorboards in front of Velma's office, the same office they had been having tea and mulling over Pansy's tattoo for a couple of weeks now. Pansy was wearing a long coat, some high heels, and a silk robe underneath it all. An intern saw her enter, her hair dry despite the downpour. 

"Do you have an appointment, Ms?" He asked. He couldn't have been over sixteen, probably interning during the summer before going back to Hogwarts. 

"Yes, I do. Pansy Parkinson." She said cooly, her lips smiling faintly at the promise of overcoming a symbol that had destroyed her life. 

The teen took out his wand from his pocket and used it to unlock an appointment book, searching for Pansy's name. "With Velma?" 

"Yes." 

The boy nodded before yelling, "Oi! Velma!" 

There was the sound of papers falling and some cursing before Velma came out of her office, her heavy boots making resounding thud sounds across the floorboards. "There she is! Ready, Pans?" 

Pansy nodded, taking off her coat and hanging it on the rack by the entrance. She left her shoes by the rack, and padded over to a reclining chair Velma motioned her to sit in. "We'll do this in parts. I'll get both your arms done and then we'll tackle the back. I'm going to do the outline, and then you get your arse back here tomorrow so I can start adding details." 

Pansy nodded, and laid her left forearm, the death mark sharp on her skin, on the arm of the chair. Velma started taking out the magical inks, the ones that would allow the pansies look like they were growing over and swallowing up a shriveled snakeskin, the death mark skillfully woven into the illusion of the crinkling remains of a snake who had moved on to greater and better things. 

The artist, her emerald hair tied back in a small knot at the back of her head, went to work on the design of the tattoo that would help Pansy move past that ugly, gruesome part of her personal history. "Bloody hell, this is going to be some of the prettiest shit I've done on a client with a mark." 

Pansy hadn't had an opportunity to ask about what the others with the mark did, so she took it then. "What do they usually do? The ones with the mark." 

"Well, I obviously can't name names, but I've had people want just a big, dark rectangle over it. Sometimes on the other arm too, so that it isn't as obvious. Some just want me to draw a big-ass line through it. Then I get ones with flowers around 'em, cause it's all about growth. I think those are some of the best. I'm well-practiced in that one." 

Pansy smiled faintly. "I suppose I'm in good hands then." 

Velma laughed a little. "You bet your arse, princess. I ain't letting anything happen to this tattoo you don't want to happen." 

They continued talking for a bit, Velma adding details and prompting stories from Pansy's matte black-painted lips. Velma added a couple of lines, then leaned back in her chair, looking at it from a distance. "Alright, Pans, I'm going to start soon." 

The instrument Velma picked up expertly, made from metal, was identical to the one muggle tattoo artists used. Beforehand, they were made by awkwardly lengthy spells and hurt far, far worse. Even though it was a sure improvement, Pansy had been preparing herself for the pain. 

* * *

The tattooing procedure isn't cuddly, but bearable. Pansy ends up staring at the ceiling and talking to Velma, with occasional stop-ins from Blaise and Draco, who come with food or a beverage. Blaise was lucky enough to not get the mark, but he did end up getting a tattoo symbolizing his and his mother's escape from death eater circles. Draco got his covered up with a floral design, the sinister python being swallowed whole by pleasant-looking blooms. 

Blaise told her all about the magical herpetology trip he went on with other researchers from the university he worked at, a group that paired up with magical herbologists, one of which was Neville Longbottom. Blaise was, as far as Pansy could tell, completely enamored. Draco gushed about his new boyfriend, which blew up the wizarding world once people discovered it was Harry stinking Potter that Draco was drinking champagne with in Southern France last summer. 

"You got anyone, Parkinson?" Asked Velma, her eyes never leaving the skin of Pansy's forearm. 

Pansy sighed. "Unfortunately, this melodramatic lesbian has no one as of late. Haven't even had anyone, either. Just a couple of hookups.”

"Well, if it's your cup of tea, I do sincerely hope you find somebody you love." 

Pansy smiled. "I think the problem is, Velma, is that it's too much so my cup of tea. Doesn't everyone say it's when you stop looking that love comes your way?" 

Velma shrugged just a little. "I'm hardly an expert on any of that. I'd say don't be afraid to take the opportunities that come by if you want to." 

"One day, one day…" said Pansy, glancing out the gap between the drapes, at the streaks of rain traveling down the windows like little channels leading down to the damp pavement that surely laid below. 

* * *

When Pansy left the tattoo parlor, back in her long black coat and pumps, the silk of her robe moving soundlessly underneath the inside fur, she felt a smile pulling at her lips, ignoring the glare from the witch across the street, click ing and clacking down the sidewalk. She was growing from the snake skins from her past. On both her forearms, she had two snake skins being strangled by flowers; one with the dark mark now concealed, the other with the word "elitism" hidden in the bumpy texture of that wretched snakeskin; it was all to show how she'd grown from that past embellished by grotesqueness. 

She felt free. 


	3. Confrontation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Sorry it took so long, I was participating in another fic event and then my life got chaotic, but more will be coming soon! Thank you for being so patient!! <3

No one had heard about Parkinson ever since the war.  _ The Prophet  _ was hungry for anything to drag those who had been associated with Death Eaters, and Pansy Parkinson hadn't been brought to the chopping block in quite some time, not since her trial. They constantly shat on Draco Malfoy; it was easy to weave lies about him planning a militia attack of dragons when he went to Romania to study, easy to take pictures of him leaving buildings and make them sinister-looking, easy to accuse him of dragging Harry Potter into dark practices since they got together. 

But Parkinson? Not a peep. And that was making Ora Elm's work quite frustrating indeed. It was no secret that  _ The Prophet _ was keen on unethical methods of data collection, and that their stories weren’t quite reliable, but at the end of the day, Ora needed a job, and the editor gave her one. This time around, the editor's rushed scrawl listed one demand: "Nail Parkinson." 

In Ora's mind, she responded, "ask, and you shall receive." It was time for hunting, and Ora had just strapped on her hiking boots. 

* * *

Pansy first detected that pesky  _ Prophet _ reporter when she left Velma's parlor after a final check-up on her tattoos. She had pulled out a sleek compact from her coat pocket to check her makeup, when in the corner of the mirror, she saw a figure; a girl with brown hair partially stuffed under a cap to fend off the cold. The girl was peering at her, trying to be discreet with a book in her hands. A million things were wrong with this image, and Pansy saw all of them the more she looked. Who would choose this part of London to read a book? There were warm libraries all over, a magical one just down the street. Second, there were the rapid glances, the green eyes frequently looking at Pansy. There was even a little note pad poking up over the pages of the book. 

Pansy smirked. It was about time that  _ The Prophet _ started keeping tabs on her. She was surprised it had taken so long. The reporter didn't look very old, Pansy figured she must have been a year below her when she was at Hogwarts. Pansy decided to continue walking along to meet Daphne for tea, and pay no care to the young woman taking notes on her.  _ The Prophet  _ would get it's story on her in due time. 

* * *

Pansy didn't want to admit it, but this reporter girl's presence was getting old. She was constantly there, outside the quaint tea shop she and Daphne frequented, outside the entrance to the floo she took home (a safety precaution for instances like these), outside the art museum Pansy had been visiting one gloomy morning. The last straw on the camel's back was when she saw that girl outside her apartment, peering back at her from in the street. Pansy had only smirked back, but inside she was furious. That little reporter was crossing the line, thought Pansy as she applied the sharpest cat eye she'd done in months. If the bulge in that girl's coat pocket was a camera, she wanted to look stunning. 

When Pansy left her apartment, she was in a knee-length dress made out of a soft chiffon with a snow-white fur stole, her highest heals, and some wool tights. In her hands, covered in black silk gloves going up to her elbows, she carried a dainty and elegant purse. She smiled in a sickeningly sweet smile to the girl in the tan trench coat who was trying to get her hair out of her eyes. She crossed the street with her best walk, making sure to have good posture for the camera that the girl had just pulled from her pocket and clutched awkwardly to her chest. 

"Darling, do I know you?" She asked in her most saccharine voice, a slight breath to the "a" in Darling, almost to the level of the iconic "Dahling." 

"Uh, no, I don't think so." Said Ora, terrified of the sharp look that dripped from her eyes. 

"Well, dear, you might want to explain to me," this was when Pansy's sweetness fled, and her voice darkened "why the hell you are outside my home." 

"I don't know what you're talking about, Ms." Said Ora, gathering up all her courage. She was the one with a camera, a voice in the most popular wizarding newspaper, not this sorry excuse for a witch. 

"You were looking at my window, sweetie. We made eye contact. You've been following me around since the tenth. I was fine with letting you do your silly story about me meeting with my friend for tea, or some conspiracy theory about where I'm headed and when. Let me have a turn on the chopping block this month. But…" Ora swallowed nervously. "You coming to my home is crossing the line. It's one think to stare at me from the street in a little tea shop. It's another to burry yourself so far in my life to know where I live. Don't force me to move earlier than I intend, buttercup." 

"I--" Began Ora. 

"Oh, honey, let me guess, you absolutely have to complete your assignment. I understand. A job is a job." Ora felt like there might be a chance that Parkinson wouldn't hex her blind. "But I can assure you my mornings are uneventful. Instead of standing out in this cold, shivering, staring at me as I make my coffee for a couple clues, make up something ridiculous and get off my back." 

There was a faint smile, a threatening one, before she said, "Does that sound agreeable to you?" 

"I can't jeopardize the ethics of my publication, Ms." objected Ora, grasping at straws. 

"We all know _ The Prophet  _ is nothing more than a tabloid at this point. Skeeter as editor has turned your publication into kindling, not trustworthy reporting. I'm sure that's why you're here; Skeeter thinks I haven't been a headline in a fair bit. So, do us both a favor, and stop lying to me, to yourself, that  _ The Prophet  _ is anything more than processed tree pulp and spilled ink. Go to a paper that actually values journalism." 

Ora could feel herself flushed. Embarrassed. Angry. She wanted to yell at that stupid, stupid girl who had just jeopardized any chance she had on turning in an assignment to Skeeter. Maybe she didn't have the right to follow Parkinson, but those pointed comments made her feel so flustered. But all Ora did was watch Pansy leave, her stupid stole wrapped around her stupid shoulders, her stupid heels making stupid sounds on the stupid sidewalk outside her stupid, stupid flat. 

* * *

Ora was on fire when she stomped into the Ministry of Magic. She wasn't thinking, just acting. She walked past the bustling floos in the entrance hall furiously and strode forcefully into the DMLE. Jittery rage flowed down to her fingertips as she walked up to the large DMLE help desk, a large circle-desk with many secretaries giving information about investigations and taking reports from wizards. 

"Hello, Miss, how can the Department of Magical Law Enforcement help you?" Asked a pleasantly-speaking secretary with round frames covering her chestnut eyes. 

"I would like to submit a report of crime." Said Ora, her fingers strumming against the mahogany counter top. 

The secretary selected a form with a large red mark on the upper right corner from a basked beside her record book. "Fill this out. To completely file a report, you must answer the questions that are marked with an asterisk." 

Ora nodded and forcefully snatched up the quill not to far from her hands and began scribbling on the parchment. 

When the report was completed and handed to the secretary, who promptly stuck it in her record book without looking at it, Ora had anonymously reported Pansy Parkinson for dabbling in the dark arts. She knew that they would, most likely, find nothing. But it would cause Parkinson some hassle. And, she'd have a story. When she got to her apartment, she immediately began drafting a scathing article. 


	4. Off to Prague

“An anonymous tip,” Explained Auror Gorgon, Hermione’s boss, as she placed a couple sheets of parchment on Hermione’s desk. “For participation in dark magic.”  
Hermione picked up the parchment, eyebrow arching as she read on. “Pansy Parkinson?” While Parkinson was investigated because of her connections to Voldemort, she wasn’t a big name in the DMLE anymore.

“It might be nothing, but just double check, with financial records and all that.” Said Gorgon before walking away to deliver some more assignments around the office.

Hermione nodded, not noticing Gorgon had moved on, still staring at the report. She got up after finishing up to the financial records room. Because of Parkinson’s past affiliations, her financial records were still checked by the DMLE, to look for purchases linked to dark magic. The initial screening usually filtered who had dark items and who didn’t, but it was still protocol to examine month’s worth of records if a report came in accusing someone of dark magic.

Hermione was half-way through finishing her second month’s worth of purchases when Gorgon came back to her desk, a piece of parchment in hand. “Parkinson is asking for passage out of the country, for work purposes.”

She took the parchment. “Who is she employed by?”

Gorgon shrugged. “She falls under a freelance magical specialist, but we don’t know what kind.”

“Are you going to reject her application?” Asked Hermione. Besides the dark magic accusation, her paperwork seemed sound.

Gorgon shook her head, moving the chestnut plait on her shoulder a bit. “I suggest we send someone undercover to see for ourselves what she does. Since you’ve been on the case so far, I was thinking you could handle it.”

Hermione looked up from the paperwork. “Really?” 

“Of course.” Replied Gordon. “You are one of our best Aurors, after all. I suggest getting a move on to Undercover Resources if you want to catch her on time.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Said Hermione, before hurrying to the Undercover Resources wing, the part of the DMLE filled with vibrant disguises, piles and piles of fake identities, and potions to transform voices into any accent imaginable, ready to see what Pansy Parkinson was up to.

* * *

Pansy’s next assignment was at a luxurious estate in Prague tackling a wealthy witch’s monster problem, the monster being an Abswift, Pansy’s specialty. Abswifts could be annoying at best and violently bloodthirsty at worst. For the most part, the older the Abswift, the more deadly (Pansy supposed being nice for so many years grew boring to them somehow), and most Abswifts out there had lived for several centuries. Thankfully, Abswifts based their entire existence around dramatics. Before they would make an appearance, they would leave boxes full of smoky shadows on their next victim’s doorsteps, often with some kind of symbol for whatever omen was most feared in the area.

Lady Viola Váňová, wife to a filthy rich wizard businessman, had written to Pansy saying she’d heard of her abilities from some friends who had seen Pansy get rid of an Abswift in Lisbon a year ago, and said she believed one would make an appearance at her party in a week’s time.

The pay was handsome and Pansy was fancying a trip to Prague anyway, so once she got the okay on traveling outside the country, she shrunk down and packed an impressive formal gown, her magical weapons and her makeup before booking a stay at a gorgeous hotel in the historic center of Prague, slipping into some pumps and whisking herself away to the portkey rental department at the ministry.

The portkey rental department was as clean and grand as the rest of the Ministry. A help desk divided the room in two: one side for a queue, the other occupied by shelf after shelf filled with portkeys, ready to be spelled to take the traveler anywhere in the world. Pansy was one of few people waiting since it was during most working hours on a Monday. When Pansy got to the front of the line, the friendly attendee with smooth, black hair asked in a chipper voice, “where are you headed?”

“Prague.” Drawled Pansy smoothly.

The witch nodded, opening a drawer in the desk and pulling out a city map of Prague. “Which neighborhood would you prefer?”

“The Old Town would be preferred.” Answered Pansy.

“At what time would you like to return?”

“Monday morning.”

The witch nodded, before going to the shelves and selecting an elegant, silver bracelet in a wooden tray. “For such a classy woman,” said the witch with a flirty wink before casting a quick  _ Portus  _ on the bracelet and extending the tray to Pansy.

“At nine o’clock in the morning on Monday, if you are wearing it, you will be transported back to our arrival room,” she said gesturing to a doorway with “arrivals” in gold lettering. “To begin your travels, simply put it on.”

“Thank you, Miss…”

“Longshire.”

“Miss Longshire,” said Pansy with a sultry voice, picking up the bracelet with her perfectly manicured fingers. “Hope to see you soon.” She put on the bracelet, and portkeyed away seeing the witch blush. 

She portkeyed, with a little nausea churning in her stomach, in a completely obscured nook on the edges of the Old Town Square. She stepped out, her suitcase in hand, into the hustle and bustle thinking she might ask that witch out for drinks when she got back. 

Soon she was absorbed into the crowd and surrounded by the gothic buildings of the Old Town. Standing over her was the astronomical clock tower, it’s elegant golden workings gleaming in the light that made it through the light grey clouds overhead. She was admiring the large church -- Church of Our Lady before Týn, she believed, when she felt it: a ripple.

Her years training with Madame Woodlark, a famed monster hunter and expert in the field, had taught her to be attuned to magical traces. Feeling the beginning of a magical occurence -- like a creature teleporting next to you -- could save your life.

This ripple was definitely from teleportation of some kind. It was far enough away she couldn’t tell if it was apparition, portkey, or floo. Her immediate thought was that someone was following her. She’d been in the square for thirty minutes now, a reasonable amount of time for someone on a surveillance mission of some sort to wait before following behind to avoid arising suspicion. But, she reminded herself, it could easily be a local wizard apparating into some hidden magical shop or bar. 

Pansy frowned and pulled out her compact; better safe than sorry, she reasoned as she used the small mirror to look around, leaning on a wall of one of the buildings forming the border of the square. She pretended to be checking her makeup as she turned the compact ever so slightly to pick up some particularly hidden crannies. She was about to snap her compact shut when she saw it: a quick movement in a dark corner by the church. Looking closer she saw a sliver of the burgundy of an Auror uniform from under a cream-colored coat. Whoever this Auror was, they were obscured by a large-brimmed hat.

So that’s why it had taken longer than usual for her request to travel to be approved; some Aurors were mulling it over in the DMLE somewhere. Evidently, they’d let her go on the condition that someone was going to see what she was up to. For a moment she wondered what she could possibly be investigated for when she remembered that  _ Prophet  _ reporter. That little sneak had probably reported her for something vague like practicing dark arts to get a story out of it. 

At least her trip to Prague was about to get a lot more interesting, thought Pansy to herself, snapping the compact closed and slipping it into the pocket and making her way to her hotel.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! I'm sorry I haven't updated this fic in such a long time! Thank you for patiently waiting! I'll have more chapters coming out soon. I hope y'all are happy and healthy <3


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